The advent of location aware (GPS enabled) and internet data enabled mobile phones and electronic communication devices has enabled a variety of location aware and information provisioning services. The combination of available technology and an exploding advertising industry that is undergoing a rapid change from traditional print and advertising TV media to internet data advertising placement has fuelled the growth of companies. The current advertising and marketing paradigm is shifting from delivering advertisements and other information from computer screens to that of mobile phones and other mobile devices.
Early services are simply attempting to enable agencies to directly target or push unsolicited advertisements, coupons, offers, or information to mobile phone users. These services are also exploiting GPS and other location aware technologies to reach specific cell phone and communication device users who may be geographically located in a particular region of interest. This class of service is notionally known as a location based advertising service.
The emergence of these services has substantially impacted users' privacy because the advertising agency has often learned much about the subscribers current and past behaviors in addition to their identities. Loss of digital identity is a very important issue and one that is rapidly gaining attention and becoming understood as more cases of identity theft and identity abuse are becoming apparent. Mobile phones, internet email accounts, location based services, and a plethora of instant messaging systems commonly permit end service agencies the ability to extract, record and exploit users' digital identities and private information.